Grover's Corner Our Town Analysis

Within the introduction of Grover’s Corners, Our Town demonstrates the theme that one should appreciate every moment of their life. The first instance of this thematic portrayal lies in the Stage Manager’s brief summary of Joe Stoddard’s life, in which he explains that “Joe was awful bright -- graduated from high school here [in Grover’s Corners], head of his class. So he got a scholarship to Massachusetts Tech. Graduated head of his class there, too. It was all wrote up in the Boston paper at the time. Goin’ to be an engineer, Joe was. But the war broke out and he died in France. -- All that education for nothing” (10). Just like Joe, the threat of death looms over everyone, and it will strike indiscriminately. This is why it is so important

to cherish every moment of life; death may take it at any moment. The next example of Thornton Wilder illustrating the theme of treasuring the humanity’s brief existence occurs when a lady in the box asks Mr. Webb whether there is any culture in Grover’s Corners. To which, he replies “Well, ma’am, there ain’t much -- not in the sense you mean … but maybe this is the place to tell you that we’ve got a lot of pleasures of a kind here: we like the sun comin’ up over the mountain in the morning, and we all notice a great deal about the birds. We pay a lot of attention to them” (25). Herein lies Wilder’s answer to how one should go about appreciating life. The culture that the lady refers to is that of the high-brow variety, Thoreau and the like. Grover’s Corners does not have this kind of pretentious culture, and they ultimately appreciate life better because of it. To appreciate life, one needs to do more than read about the beauty of it all: they need to go outside and actually experience it.

The final example, within the introduction of Grover’s Corners, of the theme of life appreciation appears when the Stage Manager talks about how the Cartwrights are going to build a new bank. He explains that this bank will have a cornerstone serving as a time capsule, which future generations will eventually dig up. He then talks about how modern man knows nothing about how the regular people of Ancient Babylon lived. “So [he’s] going to have a copy of this play [Our Town] put in the cornerstone and the people a thousand years from now’ll know a few simple facts about us -- more than the Treaty of Versailles and the Lindbergh flight” (32). The Stage Manager overtly states that the purpose of Our Town is to serve as memoir of the day-to-day lives of the American people, thus the theme of Our Town makes itself clear. People, future and present, should not only appreciate the momentous achievements of their and others’ lifetimes, but they should treasure the little moments of everyday life. Coincidentally, the biggest moment of George and Emily’s lives, their wedding day, also serves as an instance where the theme of appreciating the minute occasions in

life.